And on the seventh day, He rested.

Preach it at the Hall, Sister!  Whatever it is you're preaching. 

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Now, therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that hath known a man by lying with him; but all the women-children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves.

Well, yes; but that does not mean that things done slower are necessarily more effective. Which was my point. Also my reply was to Vegas' question - in one of the few times he has kept a civil tone - as to ""Why do you think that a being that is immortal/beyond time/always existed-always will/ would be in a hurry to do anything?". Despite his strange implication, one can see quite clearly that such a being is, at least sometimes, in a hurry in some bible passages, or at least can be seen to move quickly.


And, once again, I can only repeat that there is a difference between asking, quite reasonably, why a god did not do something against the saying of what it ought to have done.

Unless you can show that taking a week to do what could be achieved instantaneously is the more efficient way, what the ultimate point amounts to is this: that, if the Xian deity was not being most efficient then, arguably, one can imagine another god which is. And so God cannot the greatest thing, since one can think of an example which is greater.

Finally, just a reminder to you and Vegas. You have already told me that you believe (and so do I) that 'God didn't write Genesis. No book of the Bible explains things beyond what the writer can understand.' In which case, unless you are also confusingly fundamentalist (or at least adopting their frame of reference to amusingly defend the literalness of Genesis), the arguments you are both presenting in favour of a internally coherent and logical opening account in the Bible just work against your view that it was just a fallible few men what wrote scripture (i.e. so we can inevitably expect mistakes.) On this basis I think you can see why this exchange might come across as confused and, for you, self-defeating - while arch-fundamentalist Cody, the only one with a doctrinal leg to kick back with on his own terms, seems to have gone home. I hope all this helps.

The stupid never ends with you, does it?

The fact that anyone can do some things as fast as they can and do other things in a leisurely pace has been explained to you too many times in this thread for you to still be harping in this non-point of yours...


Or do you not remember any of those posts, either?

FilmFlaneur

That is not how I read your point which is better described as God shouldn't take so long to do anything.

Effectiveness is irrelevant when you have all the time to do something.
Not by the examples given. really, the Bible is the worst example to prove God does things quickly.

In order for the examples you used to work, you have to ignore a lot of verses that argue our view of time is not God's view. No one is saying you can't make that argument, only that there are some pretty good counter-arguments to that logic. It's not a real headscratcher.
I'm not speaking for Vegas, but me saying God didn't write the Bible is not contradictory to the Bible itself which says he inspired it or controlled what was written. The language and style was the writer's.

One of the things i said too was people were treating genesis in a way that is not it's intent. The first few chapters of genesis set up some basic things that even a child could understand - God created stuff in a particular order and fashion over a particular time span and set up how he was going to fix what mankind screwed up.

It's a prologue to a greater story regardless of whether we believe that story to be fiction or non-fiction. That's irrelevant to the conversation.

It's not a minority position at all. Most Christians are fine with the age of the earth and the universe being what science has determined it to be which has no bearing on whether life was created or not.

I'm not terribly concerned with labels, so my assertion is that most Christians are perfectly fine with the age of the universe being what science deems it to be.

Please quote where I say 'God shouldn't take so long'. My point was that, arguably, to be the most efficient god, He wouldn't take so long. So I ask you again: is it more efficient to take a week over something which can be achieved instantaneously? (It is worth reminding ourselves that 'a week' is the Bible writers' choice of time scale, not anyone elses'.)



I think you mean efficiency and not effectiveness here (though I am happy to debate just how 'effective' the Xian god's plan has been too). And, considering whether a god is the most efficient is important, as I have already instanced - not least since if one can think of a more efficient god than God, then God is, da facto not the greatest being possible, as He is less than one might conceive. As previously noted a Xian on this board recently took 'efficiency' (or the lack of it) as one standard by which his god could be measured and, if proved as found wanting, would necessarily undermine his faith. For this atheist and him at least, an inefficient god would be a lesser god by at least one reckoning.




This seems to limit God to one speed - slow, an odd concept. Meanwhile some Christians at least might disagree with you, viz:



let alone this further example from scripture:





But you have already claimed scripture is necessarily the work of man and hence the writings of man about God can be fallible - which, well, necessarily includes any man-conceived notion of God's view of time, derived from the Bible, does it not? You cannot both rely on scripture while, at the same time admitting that, as you put it "No book of the Bible explains things beyond what the writer can understand". Does anyone understand God's perspective? It is perfectly arguable that the writers of Genesis simply failed - or cared - to understand that their view of the Xian God was, after careful analysis, essentially an inefficient and limiting one and hence made it less of a god than one could then imagine.



Once again: the only counter-arguments, my friend, are to be drawn from a (most likely literalist) view of scripture which, as you have told me, is man-made, so necessarily limited to human understanding and, hence, fallible. You seem to be asserting, based on biblical ideas, that no-one can know the mental perspective of God, while at the same time asserting that the same idea in expression is subject to likely error. Which is it to be?



Indeed; I would agree with you - which again makes one wonder why God would 'inspire' the tale of a week of work to make all of creation when he could have inspired the contemplation of a much more efficient action to the same end. This is where I came in, in fact...



Which is why I mentioned the idea that the intention of the two or three authors of Genesis was to impress a primitive audience with a drawn-out creation myth, rather than pay due attention to internal logic. [Science, it might be remembered has its Big Bang and ensuing cosmic inflation take place within seconds] And why my various critiques of Genesis have been aimed at the fundamentalist or literalist mind set, rather than to any one realising - as you do nonetheless - the more likely context and early reception. So we are back to essentially arguing for a sensible literality of Genesis and its 'week' - but at the same time suggesting that the inspired word ought to be taken with a pinch of salt, aren't we?

FilmFlaneur

I didn't say I was quoting you.
Which is fine as long as you understand he doesn't need to.

It seems like you are saying he doesn't which comes full circle to what I said at the onset - We are really only asking why God didn't do what we think should be done.
Both ways works.
To me, you seem to be limiting his speed to one of Roadrunner status.

I am saying that God works on his own time frame whether fast or slow , immediate or glacial.
you keep giving examples of the ending of an event rather than the whole of it. It's like saying an old guy's whole life is tied specifically to his time of death. You have said this for the second time as if the notion that men wrote the Bible means that the Bible's teachings are inherently wrong.

I can easily accept men wrote the Bible, wrote it correctly in relation to its theme, and wrote it within the scope of their knowledge. It's literally what every writer does in the history of forever.

You have not even come close to verifying the lack of efficiency regarding Genesis God so it's weird that you draw this conclusion as if you had except solely on the basis of your opinion and the notion that men wrote the Bible. You'd need more than that to show flaws.

Honestly!  I created a pie just yesterday.  However, the creation myth in the Bible is in fact myth.

And any concept any mental bloke wants to come up with "can totally exist alongside the concept of a creator existing", for whatever value that random thought may have.

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Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking, which are out of place.